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Nearly all the workers of the Lowell textile mills of Massachusetts
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26 Aug 2015, 03:11

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95%(02:49) correct 5%(01:07) wrong

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48%(01:10) correct 52%(01:38) wrong

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84%(01:12) correct 16%(01:13) wrong

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Question 4

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83%(01:00) correct 17%(00:47) wrong

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Part of New Project-->[url=http://gmatclub.com/forum/new-project-reading-comprehension-review-practice-195318.html]Reading Comprehension!!- Review/ Practice[/url]

Nearly all the workers of the Lowell textile mills of Massachusetts were unmarried daughters from farm families. Some of the workers were as young as 10. Since many people in the 1820s were disturbed by the idea of working females, the company provided well-kept dormitories and boardinghouses. The meals were decent and church attendance was mandatory. Compared to other factories of the time, the Lowell mills were clean and safe, and there was even a journal, The Lowell Offering, which contained poems and other material written by the workers, and which became known beyond New England. Ironically, it was at the Lowell mills that dissatisfaction with working conditions brought about the first organization of working women.

The mills were highly mechanized, and were in fact considered a model of efficiency by others in the textile industry. The work was difficult, however, and the high level of standardization made it tedious. When wages were cut, the workers organized the Factory Girls Association. 15,000 women decided to “turn out,” or walk off the job. The Offering, meant as a pleasant creative outlet, gave the women a voice that could be heard by sympathetic people elsewhere in the country, and even in Europe. However, the ability of the women to demand changes was severely circumscribed by an inability to go for long without wages with which to support themselves and help support their families. This same limitation hampered the effectiveness of the Lowell Female Labor Reform Association (LFLRA), organized in 1844.

No specific reform can be directly attributed to the Lowell workers, but their legacy is unquestionable. The LFLRA’s founder, Sarah Bagley, became a national figure, testifying before the Massachusetts House of Representatives. When the New England Labor Reform League was formed, three of the eight board members were women. Other mill workers took note of the Lowell strikes, and were successful in getting better pay, shorter hours, and safer working conditions. Even some existing child labor laws can be traced back to efforts first set in motion by the Lowell mills women.

1. According to the passage, which of the following contributed to the inability of the workers at Lowell to have their demands met?(A) The very young age of some of the workers made political organization impractical.(B) Social attitudes of the time pressured women into not making demands.(C) The Lowell Female Labor Reform Association was not organized until 1844.(D) Their families depended on the workers to send some of their wages home.(E) The people who were most sympathetic to the workers lived outside of New England

2. The author of the passage implies that the efforts of the women workers at the Lowell mills ______.(A) were of less direct benefit to them than to other workers(B) led to the creation of child labor laws that benefited the youngest workers at theLowell mills(C) forced the New England Labor Reform League to include three women on its board(D) were addressed in the poetry included in The Offering(E) were initially organized by Sarah Bagley

3. The author uses the word “Ironically” in the first paragraph to indicate that _______.(A) none of the people who ran the Lowell mills expected that the workers would organize to express dissatisfaction with working conditions(B) the women who worked at the Lowell mills did not realize how fortunate they were to work at such a place(C) it could be considered surprising that an early effort to demand better working conditions began in an environment that was especially designed to promote worker satisfaction(D) the people who created the working environment for the women at the Lowell mills did not really understand what it was they needed(E) it was unusual for women workers of the time to organize, regardless of their work environment

4. The primary purpose of the passage is to do which of the following?(A) Describe the labor reforms that can be attributed to the workers at the Lowell mills(B) Criticize the proprietors of the Lowell mills for their labor practices(C) Suggest that the Lowell mills played a large role in the labor reform movement(D) Describe the conditions under which the Lowell mills employees worked(E) Analyze the business practices of early American factories

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Re: Nearly all the workers of the Lowell textile mills of Massachusetts
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29 Aug 2015, 23:25

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gagan0001 wrote:

Hi all,Can someone please tell me a way to improve timing in RC?I mostly get the answers correct but it takes lot of time, as for this question I was able to get all answers right but it took 12 minutes.Noting down the key points method is not working well enough for me. Sometimes to answer a question I have to read a para again and again.And that info connects somewhere else and finding that takes another read to the passage.A little help would really be appreciated.Thanks

Hey, Your problem sounds similar to mine when i started my GMAT Preparation. Not that am good enough in RC now. But atleast crossed your phase and still lot more to improve. Every one has to develop and identify their own style of crossing RC. jotting down, memorizing, skimming and returning back etc are few of them. But you need to mix your strategy with these only once you got to know wats wrong with yours.

Looking at the similarity between your problem and mine, i would like to tell you few of my mistakes during start. Check if you are also doing the same.

1. I was just reading an RC as if was reading a news paper. I used to ignore what ever i dont understand and try to skim tough sentence formations.--- Never read an RC like an usual news paper. Get involved into the RC in the way 'Arjun did hit the birds eye'. Only then you would atleast understand main content. Literally any external disturbance/thoughts/deviations of couple of seconds will make you lose the contact between what you are reading now and what you read earlier in passage.

2. Trying to understand whole sentence, no matter how big it is.--- Try to break the sentence structure. Remove the modifiers and re-read the sentence.

3. Understanding the meaning of current sentence alone.--- It helps me to understand the current sentence. But if i dont relate the meaning of current sentence with previous sentence/paragraph, i will miss the context. This will hit badly in generic questions. Try to relate the sentence with earlier one and understand the whole theme. Similarly, understand the connectivity between paragraphs too.

4. Hard Terminology--- Till you reach 700 level i dont thing you will find, hard vocabulary. So this is not an issue to you as of now. Even if you reach hard terminology without actually knowing the meaning of the term you can guess the meaning. Eg: It was one of the disastrous catastrophes i have ever seen - You may not understand what 'catastrophes' mean but the word before it 'disastrous' will indicate you that catastrophes is something bad. Just move on after that.

5. Too many characters or Technical jargons--- Give abbrivative name to each jargon or character so as you dont have to read it fully (eg: xenophobia. Break it to XP and just move on) Your brain stops understanding necessary information once you are stuck with remembering characters/identifying meaning of jargons/pronouncing a hard word etc. You really dont need them for to answer.

6. For starter you can read editorials from 'The Hindu'. But to really ace RC in GMAT you need to understand sentence structure used by native authors. For that i would recommend to Read News opinions from NY Times, Washington Post, Scientific American etc. to understand how the native authors speak.-- When you read the opinion, try to read them without seeing the title of the article. At the end of the article give your own title to the article and compare it with the given article. -- Try to understand the tone of author. +Ve, -Ve, neutral, opposing, criticizing, supportive, cautious etc.-- Try to summarize what you read in couple of sentences and cross check your understanding.-- When you read the articles, you dont need to time yourself (since the length of article will not be same as a standard GMAT Passage). For better understanding of the article try to figure out 'what are the modifiers modifying?', 'what is the noun a particular pronoun is referring to?' etc.

7. Answer choices are too close.-- Remember if you have two parts in 1 answer choice. you understand one part is correct and you dont really pay attention to the other part of answer and just move on. Thumb rule: Dont just move on while answering the passage. Use 'Move on' Strategy only for reading the passage. Until and unless you dont find the complete answer convincing dont just mark it. Thats a classic Trap. You will surely find a better choice once you complete reading all answers.

Once you are done with all above (should take a couple of months to improve), concentrate on timing. My instructor said that the ideal timing should be 2-3 min for passage and 1 min/question.

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Re: Nearly all the workers of the Lowell textile mills of Massachusetts
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26 Aug 2015, 09:22

Hi all,Can someone please tell me a way to improve timing in RC?I mostly get the answers correct but it takes lot of time, as for this question I was able to get all answers right but it took 12 minutes.Noting down the key points method is not working well enough for me. Sometimes to answer a question I have to read a para again and again.And that info connects somewhere else and finding that takes another read to the passage.A little help would really be appreciated.Thanks

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Re: Nearly all the workers of the Lowell textile mills of Massachusetts
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02 Sep 2015, 05:20

Can anyone explain why is C correct for Q.4. IMO it is A.

Labor reforms are attributable to the workers of LM and not to the LM itself. They were the one who organized the union. The following stmt "Even some existing child labor laws can be traced back to efforts first set in motion by the Lowell mills women." talks about the workers not the mill.

Re: Nearly all the workers of the Lowell textile mills of Massachusetts
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20 Oct 2016, 15:12

Indie1915 wrote:

Can anyone explain why is C correct for Q.4. IMO it is A.

Labor reforms are attributable to the workers of LM and not to the LM itself. They were the one who organized the union. The following stmt "Even some existing child labor laws can be traced back to efforts first set in motion by the Lowell mills women." talks about the workers not the mill.

By the same logic, I also got 'A' as the correct answer. Also, chose 'A' since 'C' was the correct answer for the last one

Re: Nearly all the workers of the Lowell textile mills of Massachusetts
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09 Nov 2016, 08:57

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4 mins 23 seconds, all correct. Thanks for posting the passage!

One tip, not sure if it may help anybody else but I have noticed that my reading comprehension scores have gone up significantly since I started reading every night before going to sleep. I read and absorb the material a lot faster and it also helps me focus better.

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Re: Nearly all the workers of the Lowell textile mills of Massachusetts
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03 Nov 2018, 04:29

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